Abstract
This paper examines the potential of the Fediverse, a federated network of social media and content platforms, to counter the centralization and dominance of commercial platforms on the social Web. We gather evidence from the technology powering the Fediverse (especially the ActivityPub protocol), current statistical data regarding Fediverse user distribution over instances, and the status of two older, similar, decentralized technologies: e-mail and the Web. Our findings suggest that Fediverse will face significant challenges in fulfilling its decentralization promises, potentially hindering its ability to positively impact the social Web on a large scale.
Some challenges mentioned in the paper:
- Discoverability as there is no central or unified index
- Complicated moderation efforts due to its decentralized nature
- Interoperability between instances of different types (e.g., Lemmy and Funkwhale)
- Concentration on a small number of large instances
- The risk of commercial capture by Big Tech
What are your thoughts on this? And how could we make the Fediverse a better place for all to stay?
I think if you’re hosting your own instance you could theoretically migrate the whole instance and keep your followers, right? Though again, not relevant until a stable release and even then, if it works why change it.
Even though my “main” account would have died with firefish.social I think I actually still have a Calckey.world account kicking around somewhere from when I looked at Firefish last, but thanks for the offer!
There’s a server signature that’s unique to the install.
You can kinda fake your way around it, but it still screws up federation and there’s not an Approved™ way to migrate stuff around that.